Sunday, March 4, 2012

Breakfast for Dinner? And on Pizza?

Location does something special for The Works. The restaurant is housed in an old, historic
firehouse with high vaulted ceilings and quirky bits of modern art decking the
walls, immediately creating a fun and engaging atmosphere for the patron. Underneath dimmed lights and a shellacked
surface, each table is decorated with a variety of artistic themes, from a
local preschool class’ butterfly art project to a well-laid assortment of beer
bottle caps. It’s a warm, welcoming environment. Robyn astutely shared how, as we make these
journeys, she has noted how essential the pizza parlor is to the social fabric
of our communities. All of the places we
have visited so far have had a very “local” vibe (not to be mistaken with the
uninviting “exclusionary” or “insular” vibes), with regular neighborhood
friends and families comprising most of the dining demographic. We have to say, we’re both a bit jealous of
this, having grown up in rural suburbia where, typically, pizza was ordered from
a chain, where your options and interactions were drastically limited. Pizza for dinner meant ordering from Snappy
Tomato, or feasting on a plastic sealed disc that hailed from the neighborhood
grocery freezer.

Firehouse doors! We forgot our camera and had to rely on our phones for pictures. Though they are not the best, they get the idea across!

Perusing this menu took some concentration for newcomers
like us. The Works has so many pizza
creations on the ballot, and ALL of them sound delicious! Right away, we ordered some food to start: a
salad for Robyn and fried ravioli for Courtney and Matt (yes, this time we
allowed a special guest). The starters
were fine, the ravioli was very tasty, actually, but our attention was mostly
geared toward the anticipation of the 3 personal size pizzas we ordered to
share. At $7.99 apiece, we decided to
each request a different personal size pie for maximal pizza sampling
experience. We are so smart.

It was a tough decision, but eventually Courtney went with
the Pesto Pizza (sausage, mushroom, and tomatoes), because anything with pesto
is rarely anything but wonderful. And it was.
The great big chunks of tomatoes sitting atop the crust were plump and
perfectly juicy. The toppings were piled
high and tastefully complemented one another, with the green of the pesto
creating a nice visual contrast.
Courtney loved this one, and contests that it seriously about melted in
her mouth.

Mmmmmm. Pesto!

Robyn decided on the Mediterranean (artichokes, fresh basil,
diced tomatoes, peppers, black olives, spinach, and feta cheese). As expected, their Mediterranean pizza is
full of strong flavor, thanks to the super fresh ingredients and crumbles of
ripe feta. The combination of these
pieces is what makes it great, but the individual components still shine
through. This pizza is piled extra high, and was really the only one
where a fork was truly necessary (we were warned of this by Cincinnati Magazine,
so now we are warning you).

This picture is a bit blurry, but you can still make out those giant chunks of feta.

Special Guest Matt, a well known champion of all things
breakfast, ordered the Breakfast Pizza.
This puppy offered a base of scrambled eggs and American cheese, and
allowed you to pick the meat topping of your choice (Matt, of course, went with
bacon). If we recall correctly, you are
actually welcome to add additional breakfast-y toppings, but Matt was worried
that too much would ruin a good thing, and left it at that. He was not disappointed. Courtney was actually pretty impressed with
his sharing skills, as he still willingly exchanged two of his slices for a
piece each of Robyn’s and Courtney’s.

Best all around.

All of the pizzas came to our table quickly, adorned with a
charred, bubbly crust that is the signature of a brick oven style dish. All of them were really great, and no one
regretted their individual choices.
However, by far, the favorite of the night was the Breakfast Pizza. A surprising contender for both a dinner
option and a pizza mission in general,
this pie was a savory and unique respite from the throngs of marinara and
mozzarella concoctions of which we are typically so fond. After learning of the egg/cheese base, Robyn
admitted some slight concern that the sauce would be made of “runny-ass eggs”. Thankfully, this was not the case. The blend was warm, buttery, and, well,
simply delish. There were hunks of
scrambled eggs on top and, though this might look odd on a pizza, that visual
confusion did not affect its pleasant taste.
Our only concern would be leftovers; this guy probably wouldn’t keep
well for the next day’s lunch. We
figured we should just finish it off, so as not to have to worry about its
refrigeration.

We’re not avid cyclists, but if there were a pizza from The
Works awaiting us at the end of our trek, we might be convinced to hop on a
banana seat for a relaxing ride more often! Plus, we still need to try that
Ballpark pizza, which features hot dog slices as a topping. Yummy?

About Me

We are on a mission to taste test the 50 best pizzas in Cincinnati, as determined by the November 2011 issue of Cincinnati Magazine. In doing so, we hope to expand on their reviews and offer up our own experiences at each pizza hot spot. By no means are we trained food critics, but we like pizza and we like writing, so this gives us the opportunity to enjoy both.